Yaroslav Trofimov is a Wall Street Journal reporter from the Ukraine who is fluent in Arabic. While carrying an Italian passport, Mr. Trofimov traveled through the Middle East recently interviewing Muslims for his new book, Faith at War : A Journey on the Frontlines of Islam, from Baghdad to Timbuktu (Henry Holt and Co. 2005).
In this NY Times Book Review, reviewer Philip Caputo notes that many of Mr. Trofimov’s encounters led him to the conclusion that poverty is not the root cause of Islamic extremism. More often than not, the most radical ideas regarding Western civilization came from the relatively wealthy and privileged who had experience with the West, not the downtrodden who are typically cast as the primary source of Muslim animus toward the West. One anecdotal experience is particularly telling:

On [Mr. Trofimov’s] first stop, Cairo, undergraduates dining in a McDonald’s a few days after 9/11 demonstrate that it’s possible to delight in a Big Mac and in the fiery deaths of 3,000 Americans at the same time. “Everyone celebrated,” an 18-year-old university student gushes as she dips her fries into ketchup, “cheering that America finally got what it deserved.”